formycin and Diabetes-Mellitus--Type-2

Formycin A augments insulin release evoked by glucose (5.6 mm or more), this effect not being rapidly reversible. The mechanism responsible for the insulinotropic action of formycin A was investigated in isolated pancreatic islets. It could not be ascribed to facilitation of glucose metabolism. On the contrary, formycin A inhibited glucose oxidation, lowered ATP content, and impaired glucose-stimulated protein biosynthesis. The insulinotropic action of formycin A was apparently attributable to its conversion to formycin A 5'-triphosphate, both this process and the secretory response to formycin A being abolished by the inhibitor of adenosine kinase 5-iodotubercidin. In agreement with the latter view, adenosine receptor antagonists such as 8-cyclopentyl-1, 3-dipropylxanthine and 3,7-dimethyl-1-propargylxanthine failed to suppress and, instead, augmented the insulinotropic action of formycin A. Unexpectedly, however, formycin A failed to decrease 86Rb efflux, this coinciding with a low efficiency of formycin A 5'-triphosphate to inhibit KATP-channel activity in excised membranes and with the fact that formycin A increased gliben-clamide-stimulated insulin release. The secretory response to formycin A represented a Ca2+-dependent process suppressed in the absence of extracellular Ca2+ or presence of verapamil and associated with an increased net uptake of 45Ca. Nevertheless, the view that formycin A exerts any major effect upon intracellular Ca2+ redistribution, protein kinase C activity, or cyclic AMP net production also met with objections such as the minor secretory effect of formycin A in islets exposed to a high concentration of K+ in the presence of a diazoxide analog, the resistance of formycin A insulinotropic action to bisindolylmaleimide, the poor increase of cyclic AMP content in formycin A-stimulated islets, and the pronounced enhancement by forskolin or theophylline of insulin release from islets exposed to formycin A. It is concluded, therefore, that the mechanism of action of formycin A in the pancreatic beta-cell remains to be elucidated.

Topics: Adenosine; Animals; Calcium; Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2; Diazoxide; Female; Formycins; Glucose; Glyburide; In Vitro Techniques; Insulin; Insulin Secretion; Islets of Langerhans; Rats; Ribonucleotides; Tubercidin; Verapamil; Xanthines

Pancreatic islets isolated from control rats, Goto-Kakizaki rats and adult rats that were injected with streptozotocin during the neonatal period were incubated for two successive period of 90 min each in the presence of D-glucose (11.1 mM) with or without formycin A (1.0 mM), and in the presence of the dimethyl ester of succinic acid (SAD, 10.0 mM) with or without palmitate (1.0 mM). Although formycin A augmented glucose-stimulated insulin release in both control and diabetic rats, it failed to compensate for the impaired secretory response to D-glucose in the latter animals. Likewise, non-glucidic nutrients such as SAD and/or palmitate failed to display a more efficient insulinotropic action, relative to basal insulin output, in diabetic than control rats. These results indicate that both formycin A and non-glucidic nutrients are unable, through their immediate insulinotropic action, to restore a normal output of insulin in islets of animals with inherited or acquired non-insulin-dependent diabetes.

Topics: Animals; Antineoplastic Agents; Diabetes Mellitus, Experimental; Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2; Formycins; Insulin; Islets of Langerhans; Palmitates; Rats; Rats, Wistar; Succinates